Author Profile: Anne K. Edwards

Like so many authors, Anne K. Edwards grew up with her nose stuck in a book. “I couldn’t get enough stories,” she says.

In the third grade, she fell in love with Walter Farley’s exciting Black Stallion series. An avid horse lover all her life, she reread the series over the years and still enjoys them. Though no one read to her when she was a child, her mother always encouraged her to read and write. “Books weren’t a necessity when I was a child,” states Edwards, “but Mom taught herself to write music and play the piano which wasn’t bad for a gal who left school at 15. We lived our creative dreams together.”

At 9 years of age, Edwards began writing stories which she was sure would be accepted by top known magazines and she submitted often, with The Post being a favourite target. Now retired, Edwards modestly hesitates to call herself a fulltime writer because of all the “many furry distractions that rule our home. I write while they snooze between meals.”

Today, Edwards is an award-winning, multi-genre author who writes both fiction and nonfiction for adults, as well as children’s picture books. She has penned novels in genres ranging from cozy mysteries, to speculative and fantasy, to suspense thrillers. A reviewer for more than a decade, she also regularly writes short stories and articles for magazines.

Presently, she’s promoting the release of her suspense novel, Shadows Over Paradise, the story of a young woman who travels to the South Pacific Islands to attend a friend’s wedding, but ends up nearly killed because she finds a dead body—none other than the groom’s—on her first day there.

It often takes her a year or more to finish a novel. Some have even taken her ten years due to stops and starts when another story has beckoned. She loves new ideas and often drops what she’s working on to see what would happen with a new one. As for her writing space, “I have a computer in a corner of a room that is cluttered with cats and paper and books,” she says.

Edwards describes her writing process as follows: “It begins with an idea that I want to follow to some sort of conclusion. For instance, I just worked on a new Death and Detective story where Death who is a guide for the souls of those passing over was revealed to have a special problem. Like the other such stories in the series, I wanted to see where the idea that became a plot, then a story, would lead. I usually have my ending for all stories before I begin to write. Following these ideas means I take the side roads that open up, follow false clues, and let the story unwind as I go. Having the ending is a general goal to work toward and has the ability to be changed if necessary and of necessity keeps the story focused on that point.”

After falling victim to a couple of online scams, one that resulted in a book being held by the publisher for a full seven years, and after wasting her time and efforts with agents and large publishers, Edwards is happy to have found Twilight Times Books (www.twilighttimesbooks.com). “Twilight Times Books is a very honest publisher that promotes their name and their authors and I feel lucky to be an author there. It took me several decades to find them as I started submitting at age nine and I’m now older. Lucky for writers in general there are more quality publishers out there than bad ones. One factor about find a publisher, no matter your age, do learn how to write before you submit,” warns the author.

For Edwards, the most rewarding aspect of this business is seeing the finished product of her efforts and having someone read it and say they really enjoyed or understood it.

A native of the Pennsylvania, Edwards resides in Gettysburg, where she keeps herself busy reading and writing. “I have about two million books I want to write and that many new ideas to follow.”

Visit the author at www.annekedwards.com.